


Contingency Plans

by LucyMontero



Category: The Librarians (TV 2014)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-01-28
Updated: 2015-11-02
Packaged: 2018-03-09 10:16:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,598
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3245903
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LucyMontero/pseuds/LucyMontero
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Cassandra needs to designate her emergency contact person. Her choice of whom to trust comes as a surprise and is cause for reflection in more than one Librarian.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Person

Cassandra chewed her fingernail and glanced up, again, from the book she was pretending to read.

It was going to have to be Ezekiel. There was no other option.

She groaned inwardly. This would be easier with almost anyone else. He was going to ask a lot of questions.

He was going to be glib. And smug.

This was going to be much more awkward than it needed to be.

But there was no one else, so Ezekiel Jones it would have to be.

She clasped and re-clasped her hands, twisting her fingers together as she approached the perky thief, who was perched on the table, fiddling with the Tesla goggles they'd recovered in Collins Falls. No matter how many times Jenkins told him that they could not detect UFOs, and that, furthermore, there were no aliens in the Library, Ezekiel kept at it.

"Ezekiel?" She tentatively approached.

"Yeah?" He answered without looking up.

"Do you think you can take those off for a minute, I need to ask you something."

Ezekiel pushed the goggles up on his forehead rather than take them off. He tilted his head and looked at her expectantly, like an impatient insect with 4 eyes.

"What?"

Cassandra looked around. They were alone in the main room of the Annex, but Baird, Stone, and Jenkins were about inside somewhere and she didn't want them to overhear.

"Can we talk outside for a minute?"

Ezekiel shrugged, "Color me intrigued," he hopped off the table and Cassandra followed him outside. She kept walking toward the water and Ezekiel followed, standing expectantly when she sat down on a rock.

"Ezekiel, we're friends, right? We trust each other?"

"Yeah, sure I do. Look, if this is about those missing folios, I swear I didn't take them, they're worthless, Stone is the guy you want to-"

"I was wondering if you would be OK if I added you as my emergency contact." She blurted out.

Ezekiel stared at her. She started to babble faster, in case he tried to run.

"For the Library. On the forms, you need to put an emergency contact, and I did, but that was when I thought I'd be back in New York quickly, and since we clearly aren't, then I thought I should put someone more local."

Ezekiel scratched his head. "An emergency contact? You're really that worried about something like that? I don't even remember who I put down, it almost never matters unless-" He stopped himself, realized it was too late.

He was an idiot.

Right, normally one's contact information was irrelevant.

If you were healthy.

If you didn't have a brain-grape in your head that could kill you at any second. Then the likelihood of your emergency contact needing to step up and do something increased dramatically.

"Unless you're me," Cassandra nodded, laughing almost apologetically. "Don't worry. It's because you're normal that you don't spend much time thinking about these things. But when you've been.... like me, for so long, you figure out that you are most comfortable if you have a plan. If you know what is going to happen in advance."

Nope, now he was confused again. "What's going to happen when?"

Cassandra decided to rip it off fast and clean, like a band aid. "What is going to happen if I die in my sleep."

Now Ezekiel decided he needed to sit down.

Cassandra decided there was no way out but through, and plowed ahead.

"You see, the way I saw it, when it happens, whenever it happens, if it blows in the middle of the day while I'm here, who I pick doesn't matter. All that needs to be done is call the EMTs to take me to the morgue, designate the mortuary and clean out my apartment. It's a hassel, but it's a one time deal."

She ignored Ezekiel's change in color and kept going.

"But what I'm worried about is if I die in the middle of the night, alone in my apartment. And nobody knows, because I'm alone, and then I just lay there, and there's gases building, gases, Boyle's Law, pressure, volume, loud, timpani, tympanic duct, coils in the ear, nautilus, golden ratios, petrichor-" The sounds of Tocatta and Fuge in D  minor started playing in her head, getting progressively louder. She couldn't stop, and continued to mumble with her hands over her ears, not that it helped. Science always triggered music.

"Cassandra! Hey..um, stop?" Ezekiel had her by the shoulders. He hated these freak outs. Stone was better at calming her down, which was painful for him to admit. He hated acknowledging Stone's, anyone's superiority in anything.

It was a good thing that it was such a rare occurrence.

Why wasn't she asking Stone to do this anyway?

"Sorry- sorry," Cassandra breathed out, "It'll stop in a minute."

Sure enough, in a few moments she released her hands from her ears and breathed a sigh of relief.  

Ezekiel nodded and released her."No more talk about gasses, OK?"

"Right. The idea of rotting- of not being found, it scared me, a lot, when I lived on my own the first time. I don't know why, but it really scared me that I could be there, dead, and people would pass by and no one would miss me."

Ezekiel looked at her. She looked lost, and sad.

Damn it, he was going to end up agreeing to this, and it was going to be weird, he knew it.

"So I had an arrangement with Mrs. Rosenthal."

"Mrs. Rosenthal?"

"My neighbor across the hall. She would check in on me, morning and night, just to know I was OK. And she had a key, so if I didn't answer, she would find me and I wouldn't be- alone for that long."

"Right. So, you want me to check in with you every day to make sure you're not dead?"

Cassandra rolled her eyes. "Not every day, if I come to work I obviously didn't die in my sleep. I'm not lying on my bed rot-"

"Ok, I get the picture. So, just the weekends?"

Cassandra nodded. "I know it's really inconvenient. But it doesn't have to be a personal check up, YOU don't have to do anything actually. I'll just send you a text, and if you don't get it, you text me to check. And if I don't answer..."

"I come and check."

Cassandra let out a breath. "Yeah."

Ezekiel seemed to ponder this, he gazed up at the bridge, then his head snapped back to her.

"What if you die in the shower?"

"Ew, seriously!"

"I'm dead serious! I need to be prepared about what you want me to do about seeing, you know, everything. You could be there for hours and then I find you naked and-"

"Ok, Ok," Cassanda held up her hand. "I will text you when I enter and exit the shower. In the event that I don't respond and am possibly naked AND dead, you enter the apartment with your hand over your eyes. If I don't respond to vocal contact, you take one of the towels out of the closet, and you throw it into the bathtub before you pull back the shower curtain. Good enough?"

"Sounds like a plan."

Cassandra leaned her forehead on her hands. "This is so humiliating."

"I'm just trying to cover every emergency."

"I know, but it doesn't change the fact that this isn't really a conversation I wanted to be having with you."

"Why ARE you having this with me? I would have thought someone, anyone else, would be your preferred choice."

"There isn't, I went through all the options. You are the list."

"How is that possible? I mean, I'm fantastic, but I really wasn't expecting you to be able to appreciate that. Mere mortals rarely can."

Cassandra picked her head out of her hands and gave him an annoyed huff.

"It needs to be someone from the Library. We haven't discussed all your responsibilities, but cleaning my apartment of any Library-related items before my parents arrive to claim my things is one of them. We can't have any magical notes or clues getting out into the world and falling into the wrong hands."

"Logical. So why not-"

"Jenkins is out. I won't have him critiquing my organizational system over my dead corpse."

"Good point."

"Baird would be efficient, but she already treats me with kid gloves, and the last thing I need is a daily reminder to her that I'm damaged and weak. I'll never get to do anything on the job again."

Ezekiel chuckled, he couldn't fault her logic there.

"You, on the other hand, won't care what my apartment looks like, as long as there isn't anything of value in it for you to steal. There is, actually, my grandmother's opals. They are in the false bottom of my jewelry box, and they're yours. As a thank you for doing this. And because I don't have anyone else to pass them on to."

Jones was oddly touched. "You don't have to-"

"Also, I figured it would hurt Baird to lose one of us, adding more responsibility to her would be painful. But you, I think, would be able to handle this with the least emotional investment."

"Ouch."

Cassandra shrugged and gave an apologetic smile.

"I didn't mean to imply you're cold. Just that you don't seem to get as attached to people. You've been flippant about my death from the start- you're the one that named it the brain-grape, remember?"

Ezekiel grinned. He considered it a personal triumph that even Cassie now used his perfect description to refer to her tumor. "You're welcome."

"So it is very unlikely that receiving daily reminders that I could die at any time would cause you to treat me any differently than you do now. Which is important to me. And I don't think taking care of my final affairs would hurt you very much. You have a pragmatic sensibility."

The little freak was observant. And mostly correct. "Is that why you didn't ask Stone to do this? You thought it would hurt him?"

Cassandra looked genuinely surprised. "No, not at all."

"So why did you chose me over him? He's got the big softy written all over him. I figure he'd be a much more natural choice for the person to go over all your death stuff with."

Cassandra shook her head sadly. "I could never ask Jake to do this."

"Why not?"

Cassandra tilted her head, "I thought it was obvious."


	2. The Plan

_A few days later..._

Ezekiel wiped the dirt off his face and dusted his pants.

"I just want to make it very clear when we tell Baird why we're late that it _wasn't me_ -"

Cassandra frowned at the hole in her tights and waved him off, "We know, we know."

Ezekiel carried right on. "That when she asks, who it was that tried to filch the priceless artifact, which got us trapped in the tomb in the first place-"

Stone grumbled, "Give it a rest, Jones."

Ezekiel raised his voice even louder, "That we make it **VERY** clear that it was _Jake!_ Not me! Surrounded by a tomb full of priceless collectibles, and I restrained myself. Because as much as I love money, I _hate_ mummies. My deep aversion to the walking dead kept me from violating that sacred taboo. I caused **NO** trouble, I was, in fact, the GOOD Librarian. Stone, on the other hand, untrustworthy character that he is, just had to steal-"

"Borrow,"

"Steal, _steal_ a priceless ancient whozeemacalit, and **tha** t is why we are late."

"I was inspecting it."

"Awfully handsy for an inspection. And the tomb didn't seem to think that's what was going on. The Tomb of **TRUTH**. "

"We get it," Stone grumbled, as he yanked upen the door to the annex.

Jenkins looked up as the three Librarians, covered head to toe in dust and dirt, and ...possibly decaying bandages, limped back into the Annex. Cassandra's tights were torn, Jake was scratched, and Ezekiel was in desperate need of a bath.

He raised an eyebrow. "This was a simple information gathering mission. Read the walls, then get out. Why...." His gaze shifted to Jones, suspiciously.

"Jake did it," Ezekiel jutted out his chin. "Ask Cassandra, she'll back me up."

"It was one little mistake," Jones grumbled.

"Well, Col. Baird and Flynn have already finished their task for the day, so I suggest you turn around and leave before dragging any more of that dirt in here. See you tomorrow," Jenkins turned back to his research.

Cassandra giggled.

"It wasn't funny," Stone grumbled.

"It was hysterical," Ezekiel grinned. "Made all the more funny because, for once, it wasn't my fault. Is this how you feel all the time? No wonder you're so insufferably smug."

Stone smiled weakly. "Enjoy it while you can. You guys want to get a drink? I feel like I have half the Andes in my throat."

Before Cassandra, already nodding, could say yes, Ezekiel spoke up. "Actually I've got a thing, to do, tonight. A _thing to do_. Can't make it. Remember Cas, the _thing_?"

Cassandra's eyes widened. "Right, _right_ , you're right, the thing. And I'm actually really tired, mummies are exhausting. See you tomorrow Jake." She gave a little wave, and made a hasty exit. Ezekiel gave Stone a mock salute, and strolled out after her.

Stone stood for a moment, pondering what he had just heard.

What the hell was going on?

* * *

 

The next morning, Cassandra and Ezekiel arrived early for work.

"So that was it, right? We just need to do the LIbrary's paperwork and I am done having to think about cremation and mortuaries and wills?"

Cassandra smiled. Taking Ezekiel to pick out a funeral home yesterday afternoon had been...an experience.

"Everything is settled now," she said.

"And you're sure you like the second place best? Because the mortician was much better looking at the first place and I figure if someone is going to be handling MY dead body, couldn't hurt if they were nice looking."

Cassandra nearly chocked on her coffee. Honestly, the things he said sometimes. "It's not like I"m going to be conscious to appreciate it!"

"Yeah, but you can always picture it, right? Like when you get to thinking your death thoughts- wouldn't it be comforting to know that, right before you get burnt to a crisp, a really Hot person is going to be seeing you naked?"

Cassandra couldn't help it, she started laughing, while trying not to, and it hurt her stomach. "Hold this" she thrust her coffee at him before she spilled it," you're going to kill me before the brain grape."

Ezekiel shrugged as she pulled herself together. "Tell you what, Ezekiel, when you are planning your own funeral, you can pick the mortuary based on the attractiveness of the undertaker. I wanted the place with the pretty garden that smelled nice and that is the one I am going with."

"Fair enough."

"Give me back my coffee, you are the least appropriate emergency contact I could ever have come up with" she pretended to be mad but Ezekiel just wrapped an arm around her shoulders and steered her up the walk toward the Annex.

"Come on, we still have one more thing to take care of."

"I told you I wanted to do that privately."

"Yeah- but at least let me stand somewhere where I can see Jenkins' face when you ask him?"

"You have to be discreet."

"I can-"

"More than you usually are."

"Promise," Ezekiel grinned as he opened the door for her.

Stone was just arriving when he saw Cassandra and Jones walking into work together. Laughing and joking- since when where those two that close?

Something was going on that he was being deliberately left out of, but he had no idea what. Cassandra was her normal self at work, same with Ezekiel. So what was going on after work?

He grumbled to himself as he opened the Annex doors and tried not to think about it for the rest of the day.

* * *

 

It had taken her all day to get Jenkins alone. And Ezekiel, in typical fashion, had refused to stop pestering her about it for hours.

It was her own fault. She'd picked him, she'd known what he was like. But she had to admit, today's pestering aside, he was kind of a perfect choice. Ezekiel Jones took very few things seriously, and yes, he had cracked inappropriate jokes in every mortuary and cemetery they had visited. But every time the details had shifted more personal, when they talked about what would happen to her, he got very quiet, and just listened, like he was afraid of screwing it up. So maybe he cared a little after all.

But this part, this was, in some ways, the most important part. And she had to do it on her own.

Ezekiel was out getting dinner, he was going to be mad he missed it. But he had only his own love affair with pizza to blame.

"Jenkins?" Cassandra approached him. The Annex was empty, for the moment, since Baird and Flynn hadn't returned yet and Stone was making sure Ezekiel didn't eat all the pepperoni or pocket the change.

"Miss Cillian, how may I help you?"

"I have a request to make. I think I should probably ask Flynn, since it concerns the Library, but, well, he's not here reliably, like you. So I thought you would be the best person to ask."

She could tell Jenkins liked pulling rank over Flynn.

"Young Lady I assure you that I am qualified to handle any request concerning the Library."

"There are all kinds of artifacts that are kept safe here, magical ones."

"Yes," he seemed to be waiting for her to get to the point.

"And non-magical ones?"

"Of course, not every item flies or has secret powers. Some are kept for their great historical significance."

"Are any here for... sentimental reasons?"

"I beg your pardon?"

"I mean, are there any items that are here, just, just because the Librarian felt like having them around?"

Jenkins thought for a moment. "I believe there are a pair of fuzzy dice somewhere that a Librarian insisted on having in his desk. May I ask the purpose of this line of questioning?"

"I just wanted to know if there was a precedent for adding something to the Library's collections not because it was dangerous, or magical, or ancient, but just because someone liked it. Or because maybe someone decided to leave it to the Library."

"We have received many donations from private collections."

Cassandra nodded, and swallowed. "Who is in charge of accepting donations?"

Jenkins rolled his eyes. "Well, traditionally it was Charlene, but given her current...sabbatical, I have taken over the more bureaucratic functions."

Cassandra nodded. "I thought so."

Jenkins looked at her curiously. "Do you have something you want to donate?"

Cassandra nodded, "No."

Jenkins waited.

"I mean yes, I mean, I don't have it- well, I do have it now, I suppose but I can't donate it now. In the future, though-"

"She wants to stay," from behind her she heard Ezekiel's voice. She turned to see him standing in the doorway.

"I told you-"

"It was painful watching you get to the point," Ezekiel pushed away from the doorframe and came to stand next to her. "And you need to hurry up because Stone isn't 5 minutes behind me."

Jenkins looked puzzled, "Stay?"

Cassandra nodded. "I had to decide what I wanted to do with my body, when I," she pointed to her head, made a fist, and then spread her fingers wide "Boom".

Jenkins' eyes widened a bit, but he said nothing.

Cassandra rambled on. "And I wanted to be cremated- if fighting zombies and mummies teaches you anything I think it is that cremation is definitely the smart choice. But then you have to decide where you want to go- because you can go anywhere. And while I thought about becoming part of a lake or a river or a forest, the only place I really, really wanted to stay forever... the place that- when I thought about my death, knowing I would be going there made me feel less scared and alone was-"

"The Library," Jenkins finished softly.

"She wants her urn to be somewhere in there," Ezekiel waved toward the stacks. "It's a pretty cool urn, I think it would fit in well-ow" He winced as she elbowed him. She hadn't taken her eyes off of Jenkins.

Jenkins snapped out of his thoughts with a glance to Ezekiel. "And how do you know what kind of urn Miss Cillian selected?"

"I'm adding him as my emergency contact."

"Everyone needs to have someone reliable to take care of these things," Ezekiel grinned proudly.

"And yet she chose-"

"Oh, I need that form as well," Cassandra added apologetically.

"The form is a simple matter," Jenkins turned back to a filing cabinet and almost without looking pulled out Cassandra's file, opening it to her emergency contact form.

"And the rest?"

Jenkins paused before turning around. "It is, an unusual request," he reached into his pocket and pulled out a handkerchief,"but I can't think of a reason why not."

"Really?" she broke into a smile.

Jenkins quickly wiped his eyes and turned around. "You have impeccable taste, Miss Cillian. And I would be honored to... look after you."

Much to Jenkins' surprise, Cassandra leaped forward and hugged him about the waist. The old knight looked more than a bit uncomfortable, and patted her awkwardly.

"There, there, no need to cause a scene. And I want you to know that I accept this request with the understanding that this..." he looked down at where Cassandra's head was buried in his shoulder, a bit puzzled, "happy event will take place when you have passed the age of 80 and have enjoyed many years of your retirement. Now, I will go make a note of it so that we have an appropriate place in the card catalog. Maybe somewhere with the Egyptian artifacts..." He disentangled himself and started up the stairs.

"Just leave the corrected form on my desk so I can take Mrs. Rosenthal out of our contact list, hmm?" He called back to them as he disappeared into the stacks.

Ezekiel grinned at a once again bubbly Cassandra. "I'll do it. You go back to work."

He was shocked when Cassandra suddenly crushed him a hug, then skipped off to do something mathy.

"Honestly, never heard of anyone so keen about their own funeral," he muttered under his breath as he filched some white out and a pen to add his name and contact information to the bottom of Cassandra's paperwork.

Stone was standing in the hall, a pizza box in his hand. He was too far away to overhear what was being said, but he had just seen Cassandra hug a tearful Jenkins? And then Ezekiel? What in the world was going on?

He strode into the room and dropped the pizza abruptly next to the paper Ezekiel was filling out.

"Oy! Watch it mate, official documents and all!" Ezekiel shoved the greasy box further away and finished up the last few boxes.

Ezekiel Jones was ignoring pizza for paperwork? Stone looked around for signs the Annex had been sucked into an alternate dimension while he'd been out.

Suddenly, Ezekiel was loping towards him. "Finally! I am starving. Make a space," he had the box in his hand and dropped it on the center table, missing a priceless medieval manuscript by inches.

Stone kept moving forward to look at the file Ezekiel had been altering. "Cassandra Cillian" was written on the cover of the folder in looping gold script. The date of their arrival at the Library was printed below it, with a dash. He supposed the dash would be followed by the day she retired.

"What were you messing with Cassie's file for?" He asked, hesitant to open the file himself.

"Putting in my contact info."

"Why would your information be in her file?"

"I'm her in-case-of-emergency person," Ezekiel said around a mouthful of pizza.

"Bullshit," Stone declared. "Be honest."

Ezekiel shrugged, strolled over, pizza in hand, wiped his fingers on Stone's shirt and used them to open the file to the page he had just filled out.

There, staring Stone in the face, was the name "Ezekiel Jones", it was scrawled next to "In case of an emergency, please contact:". His phone number, e-mail, and address followed. Next to "Relationship to employee:" he had written "Incredibly talented friend."

Jones? She'd asked Jones? What the hell?

"You have the handwriting of a serial killer," Stone mumbled.

The thief shrugged and went back for more pizza. "You better eat before it gets cold."

Jake grabbed a slice and ate it without tasting a thing.

 


	3. The Present

_A few weeks later_

"You're not busy right now, right?"

Cassandra was at the main table, pouring over her latest meticulously drawn ley line maps. She'd been going over the same data all morning, and she was getting the sinking feeling she was going to have to re-search the last mummy-infested tomb they'd visited.She hated mummies, not so much because they were scary, although they were rather alarming, but what was more bothersome was that they didn't respond to any of her skill sets. She usually ended up cowering in a doorway or a corner until it was over- "it" usually being Jake hitting them with something heavy. It was frustrating, and a tad humiliating. She hadn't looked up at the sound of Ezekiel's voice.

"I am, actually, I've just-"

"Good, I need to talk to you."

Cassandra's attempt to put Ezekiel off was thwarted when he casually hopped onto the table in front of her, directly on top of her map.

"Ezekiel I was working on those-"

"We have a problem."

"-I need them to find the source of the disturbance-"

"I know what the source of the disturbance is."

"Really?" Please don't say mummies. Please don't say mummies.

"It's you."

"Me?"

"Yes."

" _I'm_ disturbing the flow of magical energy being diverted from the Vortex of Life?"

"What? No. Not the disturbance of the vortex of _that_ life. The disturbance of _my_ life."

"Pardon?"

"Well, my social life. Look at this." He handed her his phone. It was open to his text messages. After a message from the pizza place confirming his order for lunch, the previous messages were-

"They're all from me."

Of course they were. Their system of 'proof of life' verifications had been in place for a few weeks. There were probably a hundred messages. Fortunately Cassandra's mobile plan had unlimited talk and text.

"This is a problem how? You agreed to this system."

"Yeah, and it was all good, until I got brain grape-blocked."

Cassandra just blinked. She really wasn't sure what to say. Fortunately, Ezekiel launched into a more detailed explanation.

"I was down the pub the other night, making great progress with a lovely Canadian bird, who happens to be a double jointed yoga instructor. That's like finding a unicorn. So, I'm teaching her the around-the-table-"

"Do I want to know what that is?"

"Oy! Mind out of the gutter Caz, it's a billiards shot. Anyway, I'd put my phone on the table, and while I went to get the beers, she looks at it-"

Cassandra raised an eyebrow. "And that didn't make you think she probably wasn't a great choice of companion?"

"That she snooped? Please, it made me hopeful. Naughty girls will usually let you-"

"Ok!" Cassandra held up a hand to stop the train of thought. "What does this have to do with me?"

"She saw all the text messages from you and assumed that I had a girlfriend. And in a disappointing display of principles, but an impressive feat of dexterity, she managed to simultaneously toss my phone into the far pocket and the beer into my face. And then she stormed off."

"Oh, Ezekiel, I'm sorry."

"So was I. Anyone with that level of flexibility-"

"But what do you want me to do?" Cassandra wondered if he was going to change his mind about being her emergency contact.

"Nothing. Literally, do nothing from now on."

Cassandra, once again, blinked.

"OK, good talk, Caz," Ezekiel smiled, clapped her on the shoulder, and hopped off the table.

"Wait!" Exasperated Cassandra reached out to grab his arm, which was when she noticed light glinting off a small silver bracelet on her right wrist. A bracelet that had not been there seconds before.

She held her arm up, examining it. "What is this?"

"The solution to our problem."

"The solution to our problem is a bracelet?" It was, to be honest, kind of pretty. Although it looked silver, it was remarkably light. The luster wasn't right for titanium, too shiny, and the links were too small to be nickel. Also, they were incredibly smooth, almost soft feeling.

She peered at it. "What is this made of?"

"SGPSLT1031."

"Huh?"

Ezekiel shrugged. "That's what DARPA called it. Those Defense types, no creativity at all."

"You stole this from DARPA?"

"Of course not. I stole _parts_ of it from DARPA. And parts from NASA, and parts from a virtually anonymous subcontractor..."

"Stop showing off and explain please?"

"You take all the fun out of it," Ezekiel pouted. He gestured to her wrist, "This is a precisely calibrated instrument that will track, among other things, your heart rate, body temperature half a dozen other biometrics-"

"Like a Fitbit!" Cassandra smiled.

The expression on Ezekiel's face was pained, and he cupped his hands around her wrist. "Shh, don't listen darling."

Cassandra was a bit taken aback, until she realized that by 'darling', he meant the bracelet. He gave Cassandra a stern look. "No, _not_ like a Fitbit. Calling her a FitBit is like... calling the Apple Watch a sundial."

"Come to think of it, won't the Apple Watch-"

"The Apple Watch is a bulky monstrosity compared to my beautiful and completely unappreciated creation. It not only monitors heart rate and respiration, but sends the data to an app I programmed here-" he tapped his phone.

"Over WiFi?"

"Over a WiFi like network that the Department of Defense isn't quite finished beta-testing."

"Is this legal?"

"Not even close. Don't worry, they'll never miss it."

"Miss what?"

"Well, among other things, the materials to make that gorgeous, completely undetectable, biomonitor you're wearing. And the satellite."

"You stole a satellite!"

"Does it really count as stealing-"

"Yes it does, even if they don't know it's missing, we've been over this."

"Well, if if makes you feel any better, I promise to put it back the minute you're dead. And really, wouldn't you rather it be watching you than some poor Afghan family?"

Cassandra glowered, but she couldn't help but roll the bracelet between her fingertips. Whatever space-age material and tiny invisible circuitry was inside it, it was remarkably pretty. And surprisingly comfortable. It felt almost magical. She frowned, Ezekiel better not have stolen parts from The Library as well...

"So, the iCab will passively monitor your state of health, and in the event of cardiac arrest or a drop in body temperature, it will alert me."

"So if I die-"

Ezekiel held up his phone. "This goes 'ding.'"

"Ding?"

"If you want I can program a different ringtone- death tone?- alert tone. What would you like? Harps? A requiem? 'Stairway to Heaven?'"

Cassandra tried not to smile, then frowned at something she'd heard. "What is iCab?"

Ezekiel pointed to her wrist. "That's iCab. **I** s **C** assandra **A** live **B** racelet."

He punctuated each word with a little tap on her wrist. Cassandra stopped gazing at her new jewelry and gave him a level look. "Seriously? That's what you called it? That's not a little macabre?"

He shrugged. "It was originally the "Is Cassandra Dead Detector", but I needed more vowels."

OK, he was right. iCab was better.

"What happens if I break it?"

"You can't."

"Go through a metal detector?"

"Strictly speaking, not quite a metal, won't set it off. Same with an MRI. You could even put your hand in the microwave. Ok, actually that is still probably a bad idea, but the point is the bracelet wouldn't make it worse."

"Get it wet?"

"Won't affect it."

"Lose it?"

Ezekiel smiled, "Unlikely. OK, we're good? Good. Stop texting me."

At Cassandra's mock look of offense he rolled his eyes. "Fine, just stop texting me about not being dead. And the shower - that definitely upsets the ladies. In fact, just in case, be aware I'm changing your name in my contact list to "Chuck"."

"Because I'm sure discovering that a man named Chuck is texting you his shower habits won't raised any red flags for your new lady friends."

Ezekiel thought about that. "Huh," he shook off the complication, "I'll work it out."

As he was heading out the door, Cassandra, still examining the iCab, realized something. "Hey, how do I get it off?"

Ezekiel grinned, "Like I said, you won't lose it."

Cassandra looked, but for the life of her she couldn't find a clasp. She had no idea how the pickpocket had even gotten it on her without her knowledge. She sighed; at least it was pretty.  By the time she got back to her map work, she'd forgotten it was even there.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to everyone who has left notes, I hope everyone is enjoying the new season. The rest of this story will all have taken place prior to the Season 2 opener- although I guess it goes slightly AU since it assumes they didn't go their separate ways permanently after Peru. There's probably 2 chapters left, and Jake is much bigger player in those.


End file.
